Hallows Quest
by kevinrunsfree
Summary: The effect of having made his diary into a Horcrux is noticeable only to Tom Riddle: when he has it with him, people enjoy his presence. When it's back in his dormitory, people avoid him. When a girl by the name of Lovegood starts talking about three Hallows that can make the beholder Master of Death, and a wand more powerful than any other, he's glad he has it with him today.


The handsome face of Tom Riddle was less handsome than the year before.

By no means did this make him unattractive. His face was still the kind of good-looking that made sixth year girls throw him meaningful looks and first year girls drop their books and fourth year girls slip into a fit of giggles every time he walked by. His cleancut hair was emulated by every boy in his gang, who hoped to look like him, and despised by every other boy in school, who knew they didn't have a chance in hell of passing for him in the slightest. His school robes, second-hand, had started a trend that hadn't died out since his first year, and every student sought out their own robes in thrift stores and hand-me-downs, to the point that on two separate occasions, a student had been reprimanded for wearing their older brother or sister's robes that did not match the house they had been sorted into. Tom was just as popular as ever.

But his eyes had lost some of the light in them.

His features were rugged, like a war-worn Auror's. Though his skin was smooth it had a semblance of having been cracked, like s scar had cut a jagged path over his skin and not quite healed right. It wasn't quite noticeable to other students, but they did unconsciously seem to give him a wider berth in the halls, parting like the red sea when he walked through a crowd. His gang had taken to a little less joking, a little more sullen silence in his presence.

This effect dwindled when he carried his diary around with him, tucked tightly in between the pages of _Secrets of the Darkest Art_ in his schoolbag. He found it useful to leave the diary in his dormitory on days he needed to intimidate, and prudent to bring it along on days he needed to charm.

And as he found himself walking away from a particularly dull prefect's meeting, having persuaded the Head Girl to let him leave early, he mentally congratulated himself on the foresight of bringing the diary along with him today.

He didn't bother wandering the castle to search for his friends. They awaited him in the entrance hall, exactly as he had told them too, servants waiting dutifully for the return of their master.

But the thuggish grow bored in the absence of their leader, and he found them not awaiting his return with bated breath, but surrounding a Ravenclaw girl one year their junior.

She had long blonde hair that Tom suspected she dyed; pale blonde meant aristocracy and she looked far from it. For one thing, her hair was tied back in almost a braid, but it looked like she'd just taken to twirling it into a wrap and then tying it with two hair ties, one blue at the top and one yellow at the bottom, where she had affixed what appeared to be a tiny plastic bumblebee about the size of a jellybean. She had a pair of bizarre looking sunglasses perched on her head, with mismatched blue and pink lenses. She had a small book tucked under her arm, and she was reaching for a necklace that Lestrange was currently suspending in mid air three feet above her head with a sneer. The girl seemed unperturbed by the fact that Lestrange also held her own wand in his left hand, more concerned with the triangular charm on the necklace.

Tom stepped closer to the group, and they all froze as the half-presence of another soul entered their little party. Fear and admiration filled their eyes, and Avery squeaked "Tom!" as he gave him a slightly terrified, awestruck smile.

"You're out early." Lestrange's own smile, plastered onto his face, faltered a little as he caught the eye of Riddle. Everyone momentarily forgot the sixth year still desperately hopping and groping at the air.

"I left early." Tom confirmed, and there was a moment of collective relief as his group relaxed in the knowledge that they had not gotten the time wrong.

Tom's eyes wandered over to the girl. As they fell on her, an unspoken question, Rosier hastened to answer.

"Loony here-"

Tom raised an eyebrow. Rosier coughed, fumbled, recovered.

"Er, Luna. Luna Lovegood."

The last name sounded vaguely familiar to Tom. It didn't immediately ring any bells, which meant she was most likely nothing. Half-blood. He knew the names of the mudbloods, he knew the names of the purebloods. Lovegood. Could be some obscure pureblood line who never did anything worthwhile with their lives.

His eyes flicked back to the girl, which Rosier took as a sign to continue.

"She claims the Tale of Three Brothers is true. You know, that old children's story from Beedle the Bard?"

Tom just smirked. He never grew up with wizard children's fairytales, and though he didn't consider them of enough importance to matter whether he knew them or not, he didn't like to admit when he didn't know something.

"It is true." The girl finally spoke, her voice whimsical in spite of her current circumstances.

"Yeah," snickered Dolohov, "As true as Babbitty Rabbitty."

The group let out a great chorus of laughter, excluding Luna, who had now turned her eyes to an equally unamused Tom.

"It's the Peverell family, you know." She was addressing Tom directly, as if he should know who they were. It was another vaguely familiar name, not of enough importance for him to remember immediately.

"What is?" Tom was already growing bored with the whole conversation.

"They're the brothers." Luna's voice twinkled like wind chimes. "The ones who have the Deathly Hallows."

"The _what_?" Mulciber spoke up, a rare question coming from the usually silent boy. He sounded less scoffing and more incredulous than the other boys, as though he couldn't believe Luna's absurdity.

"The Deathly Hallows." Luna insisted in a tone that implied they were all stupid. Tom saw Lestrange clench his fist tighter over Luna's wand, raising it slightly. If she saw, she didn't seem to pay any mind.

"The cloak. The stone. The wand." She pointed up at her necklace as if this would explain.

For the first time since his eyes had initially flickered over the three-shape charm, Tom saw the symbol on the necklace. He recalled his oaf of an uncle, the ring on his finger. He glanced down at his own hand, where the ring sat on his right index finger. The same symbol was set into the large black stone. A vague memory stuck out, plucked from his uncle's mind. " _Know how much I've been offered for this, with the Peverell coat of arms engraved on the stone?"_

"What's she on about?" Dolohov sniggered, looking to Tom and treating Luna as if she weren't there. Dolohov always took such delight in even the most mediocre forms of cruelty.

"From the story? The Cloak of Invisibility. The Resurrection Stone. The Wand of Destiny." She traced the outline of the symbol with her finger. "Each united together making the possessor the Master of Death. Daddy knows all about them, he's been trying to track them down for years. Personally, I would want the cloak of invisibility, but Daddy says everyone wants the wand, it's the most powerful wand in the history of wizardkind."

Master of Death. Most powerful wand in the history of wizardkind.

Lestrange rolled his eyes. "Well, this has been a wonderful bedtime story-"

"Professor Dumbledore believes in them." Luna interjected with a slight glint in her eye.

"That daft old fool will believe anything." cackled Avery. "What was it he said in Transfiguration class this morning?"

Rosier took on a rather poor imitation of Dumbledore's voice. " _Muggles are brilliant in their own ways...I have yet to find a way to transfigure a wizard-made candy into a suitable substitute for the muggle-made lemondrop."_

The boys laughed again, excluding Tom.

"Oh he's not that old." speculated Luna, seemingly ignoring Rosier's impression. "Maybe a hundred, give or take fifty years."

"Dumbledore believes in them?" The other boys jumped when Tom spoke, their laughter cutting off immediately. His voice was steady, but he was clearly interested. The other boys underestimated Dumbledore; indeed, most students did. To them, at the most he was an unconventional teacher. Tom knew better.

"Oh yes." Luna's voice practically sparkled. "We discussed it once, briefly, when I offered him an issue of _The Quibbler_."

"The what?" Tom had lost track of the conversation again. Luna's inability to make any sort of sense for more than ten seconds at a time annoyed him.

" _The Quibbler_." Luna reached in her bag, pulling out several copies of a brightly colored magazine which she haphazardly stacked upside-down in her hands.

"Would you like one?" She held out a copy to Lestrange, first. "Free. Of course, I'll want my wand back, first." Her eyes floated up to sky, where the Deathly Hallows charm still suspended. "And my necklace."

Lestrange scoffed at her and made to move the wand behind his back.

"Go on." Tom's voice rang clear, and Lestrange halted. He turned to look at Tom incredulously. Tom merely glanced at him before fixing his eyes back on Luna. Lestrange just stared, not obeying the order. Tom stepped forward, snatched the wand out of his hand, and held his hand out under the necklace. Lestrange did not hesitate any longer, obediently lowering it into Tom's awaiting palm.

Tom pointed Luna's wand at her, appraised her with his eyes and then, with a sufficiently charming smile, turned it around and handed it to her end-first. She stuck it behind her left ear, and held her hand out for the necklace.

Tom twirled the charm in his fingers, reluctant to let it go. His mouth twitched, he gripped it hard, and then placed it carefully in her hand. She returned the favor by placing an issue of _The Quibbler_ in his.

"Would anyone else like one?" She looked around at the rest of the Slytherin boys, holding out the other copies to each of them. They all glanced at Tom in uncertainty, but he ignored them. Left with imitation as their only option, they each took a copy. Avery glanced around to make sure they were alone before he took his, and then hastily stowed it out of sight in his bag. The other boys merely let Luna press one upon them before pretending like they had nothing in their hands and had not just let a Ravenclaw sixth year touch their fingers.

"Potions starts in a few minutes." Tom spoke calmly, as though his entire life plan hadn't just changed entirely. "Why don't you go ahead? Tell Professor Slughorn I'll be a little late. He'll understand."

Lestrange opened his mouth, but thought better of talking back and closed it without a word. Slowly, not wanting to be the first to leave or the last left behind, each boy turned and left the entrance hall, not daring to glance back.

"You're not going to Potions?" Luna had flicked her bizarre sunglasses over her face, obscuring her eyes from Tom. "I don't blame you. Professor Slughorn collects people like nargles collect shoes."

He didn't care enough to ask what nargles were, just gave her a vague sort of smile that might indicate he'd gotten the joke if she'd made one, and might indicate he understood what she was saying even when he hadn't. His mind was too focused on the new information to do a convincing impression of understanding, it kept repeating itself like a song stuck in his head: _Master of Death. Most powerful wand. Dumbledore believes._

"Speaking of shoes, yours is untied." She pointed down to it, adjusting her glasses over her face. "Don't worry. I don't think it was a Blibbering Humdinger that did it. I think they just came untied themselves." She gave him a beaming smile as though she'd just told him grand news. "With these glasses, you can see all kinds of invisible creatures, you know."

He flicked his wand and his shoelaces tied themselves. After a moment of calculation, he returned her smile, once again mentally patting himself on the back for bringing the diary along today. With a girl this daft, the only hope of any kind of information was enchantment, and not the magic kind.

He took a step closer to her, reaching out and pushing her glasses back up into her hair.

"But with them, no one can see your beautiful eyes." He stared deep into her face with a practiced tenderness, confident and passionate.

"Are you making fun of me?" Luna blinked at him. Her voice bland, no sign of anger or resentment, as though this was just another part of the usual routine.

"No." The words came out sounding harsh, but there was no other way to answer, his desperation to get answers mixing with his irritation at the girl's stupidity and colliding with his practiced patience making it hard for him say much more without blowing his own cover. He recovered his smile, tucking a stray wisp of hair back behind her ear. "They really are beautiful. They sparkle more than your necklace did dangling in the sunlight."

"I knew you would like my necklace." For a moment Tom thought she had caught him, thought she would turn around and accuse him of wanting to take it. Instead, she took his hand from her face and grasped it between her own, running her thumb over his ring.

Without thinking, he jerked his hand back, covering the ring with his left hand. Luna didn't seem surprised by this, but frowned momentarily.

"Sorry." She clutched her hands behind her back. "When I saw it, I knew you were a believer, too."

Tom remained silent, once again finding himself unable to follow her line of thought. She took his silence for confirmation and nodded at him.

"I've been helping Daddy with the quest since I was a little girl." She didn't seem quite old enough to refer to herself being a little girl as though it was long ago. "I was going to tell him that Dumbledore was a Hallows Quester too, when I saw him over the holiday."

"You mean he's-...you're looking for them?" Tom perked up at this information. If Dumbledore was looking for these, spending his time outside of grading homework and teaching classes...then they must be real. "The Hallows?"

"Yes. Aren't you? I thought for sure you would be interested, I know I am, it would be nice to have the Cloak of Invisibility, don't you think? Could turn your whole body invisible and just walk around as a floating head, or a nose, wouldn't that be wonderful?" She slipped into a dreamy silence, apparently imagining strolling the Hogwarts corridors with nothing but her nose peeking out from the cloak. "Of course, it's impossible to find a cloak of invisibility, isn't it? Much easier to find the wand. That's what everyone's after, anyway, and at least that one has a trail."

A trail.

"You seem to know much more about this than I do, Luna." He laughed lightly, trying to show just the right amount of interest so as to keep her talking but not seem too intense about it. "You're quite clever. You know what they say about beauty and brains..."

"I am in Ravenclaw." She replied blankly, his flirtation soaring right over her head again. "But it's not cleverness here, really. All the work's been done, in the history books. The Deathstick, the Elder Wand, the wand of Loxias...it pops up all the time."

So it was all about tracing, tracking it down to the last known owner...and then just paying them a respective visit. Wherever the trail went cold, he was sure he, Tom, out of anyone else, could get the information he sought. No one else dared to go as far as his methods.

"You've been quite useful, Luna." He smiled politely as he handed her _The Quibbler_ she'd given him back. Pointing his wand at her, he murmured, " _Obliviate,"_ before walking back towards the castle.

Right before he reached the large castle doors, he heard her twinkling voice call out behind him.

" _Tom!"_

He turned to see her running towards him, eyes wide and skin rather pale.

She stopped a few feet in front of him, seeming lost for words. She held out her hand.

"...Would you like the latest issue of _The Quibbler?_ Free."


End file.
